Comply with the forest law is an obligation, not ambition

President Dilma Rousseff came to the United States this week and revealed, next to the American president, Barack Obama, some Brazilian contributions to tackling global warming. But what she put on the table was much more modest than it could and should.

In short, the situation is as follows: at the end of the year, representatives of all countries meet in Paris at the 21st UN Conference on Climate Change (COP-21). At the time, they need to reach an agreement so that the average global temperature increase this century does not exceed 2 ° C above the temperature recorded in the pre-industrial era – today, the heating is 0.89 ° C.

For this to happen, countries need to say what they will do to cut their emissions of greenhouse gases, especially the major global emitters. Brazil is in this group, mainly due to deforestation and forest fires (although in recent years, the contribution of energy and agricultural sectors has grown).

In his second term, Obama found an environment that favored building a positive legacy in the field. He has caught bilateral talks with major emitters in the world, including major emerging countries. China, for example, currently the largest emitter in the world, announced that it will have a peak in emissions by 2030 or before and who have installed until that year 100 gigawatts of solar energy – the equivalent of two thirds of all Brazilian electric park.

No country has taken such steps because it is “nice”. All this is a reflection of a world that knows that global warming is a fact and to reduce their impacts is safer and more beneficial than ignore them, and that those who contribute most to the problem are the ones who need to move.

But Brazil, in its announcement, could not commit nor with its own law. Rousseff has pledged to recover 12 million hectares of deforested areas by 2030. But she forgot that three years ago, signed a new Forest Code which estimates a 24 million hectares liability in the country. Ie in front of the American president assumed that only half of what she knows is required will be done within that time.

There are challenges to put into practice the Forest Code yes, and this is known. A survey conducted by the NGO Conservation International Brazil in all states, released in May, indicates that we still need to mobilize farmers to join the Rural Environmental Registry, and that states lack the financial resources, infrastructure and qualified personnel to put the law to run in its entirety.

But the signs that Dilma gives internally and externally, is that: first, the country has no capacity to enforce its laws; Second, change the Forest Code, which already anistiara half the forest liability in 2012 to see if this way the recovery out of the paper, it was not for real; and third, Brazil think that global warming is not a serious matter enough to make a serious commitment.

Forests are one of the main natural treasures that Brazil has and everyone knows that – everyone except Brasilia. With his poor speech, Dilma ignores this fact and still plays Brazil to corner the international debate, leaving to assume leadership in one of the most important issues in modern history.

* Originally published in the Planet Blog , the magazine’s website Season.